Windmills to shut at night following demise of rare batKathy Mellott - The Tribune-Democrat October 17, 2011

LILLY  Night operation of the windmills in the North Allegheny Windpower Project has been halted following discovery of a dead Indiana bat under one of the turbines, an official with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said Monday.

The finding marks only the second location where an Indiana bat has been found dead under a wind turbine. Two Indiana bats were found under turbines in the Mid-west, said Clint Riley, supervisor for Fish and Wildlifes Pennsylvania field office.

While finding the dead bat is not good news for any of us, it does show the monitoring works, Riley said from his State College office.

If it was a rare bat then that would mean that there would be few of the same species around. Maybe the bat was lonely, couldn’t take the solitude any more, and committed suicide? Who are we to disrespect their wishes?

I was wondering why we don’t see much from “The Onion” around here any more - and here’s my answer: satirists just can’t write anything as wildly outrageous as the Libs come up with (with a perfectly straight face) on a daily basis...

4
posted on 10/18/2011 11:52:25 AM PDT
by Uncle Ike
(Rope is cheap, and there are lots of trees...)

Even if the windmills are shut down at night, they will still fulfill 100% of their mission. Sure, power generation will drop off by 50%, but that was never the primary reason for windmills, anyway.

Turning windmills are designed to make people feel good by convincing them that they are somehow moral, because they support “green” projects. Since they can’t be seen at night, it really makes no sense to run them. Might as well save some wear and tear.

7
posted on 10/18/2011 11:56:18 AM PDT
by Haiku Guy
(If you have a right / To the service I provide / I must be a slave)

OMG! a bat was killed in Indiana. What are we to do. The loss-the tragedy. Not only was this bat killed but it also eliminated it’s dna from the blood line of thousands of future bats and also retarded the evolution of bats into retardos of the future. I believe that we should shut down the entire windmill industry in all states due to the danger that is imposed on rare, retardo, bats of the future. We just cannot take the chance that it will happen again. Actually no animal should have to suffer death just because of human development of anything. I really believe this! Honest

9
posted on 10/18/2011 11:57:43 AM PDT
by dirtymac
(Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country., Really! NOW!!!)

I don’t see the problem, we don’t need electricity at night anyway. The Amish don’t have it and they get along fine. In fact they breed in the dark while we are watching TV.They have big families as a rsult of no electricity.

I’m torn. I’m as much for inexpensive, economic energy for all as anyone. But unlike most other animals, bats really are endangered, and they multiply so slowly that it doesn’t take much to devastate a population.

Not only that but subsurface coal mines can provide new bat habitat, maybe denning sites that will be relatively free from disturbance and so, transmissible diseases.

The bat's greatest threat at this time isn't windmills so much as it is a highly infectious fungal disease called white nose or some such thing. It was introduced here from Europe where bats have some resistance to it but unfortunately American bats are not resistant. It's caused bat populations to drop severely which means the bugs and pests they would normally gorge on can prosper.

Don't look down on the poor bats, their guano provided one of the main ingredients of gunpowder and one day we may need them to do it again if the libs attain their goal of turning this country into a third world unindustrialized hellhole.

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